Athletics are extremely important in our society. In addition to competing against each other on the field, athletes often compete with each other off the field. For example, student athletes routinely compete with each other for a spot on the team, or even if they are already on the team, for more “game time” or a higher starting position. Graduating high school seniors are also in competition with other student athletes for coveted college athletic scholarships and the like. Also, amateur athletes in some sports often compete with each other for jobs as professional athletes in that sport. The critical factor in all of these competitions is the athletic performance, or athleticism, of the particular athlete, and the ability of that athlete to demonstrate or document those abilities to others.
Speed, agility, reaction time, and power are some of the determining characteristics influencing the athleticism of an athlete. Accordingly, athletes strive to improve their athletic performance in these areas, and coaches and recruiters tend to seek those athletes that have the best set of these characteristics for the particular sport.
To date, this evaluation and comparison of athletes has been largely subjective. Scouts tour the country viewing potential athletes for particular teams, and many top athletes are recruited site unseen, simply by word of mouth. These methods for evaluating and recruiting athletes are usually hit or miss.
One method for evaluating and comparing athletes' athleticism involves having the athletes perform a common set of exercises and drills. Athletes that perform the exercises or drills more quickly and/or more accurately are usually considered to be better than those with slower or less accurate performance for the same exercise or drill. For example, “cone drills” are routinely used in training and evaluating athletes. In a typical “cone drill” the athlete must follow a pre-determined course between several marker cones and, in the process, execute a number of rapid direction changes, and/or switch from forward to backward or lateral running.
Although widely used in a large number of institutions, high schools, colleges, training camps, and amateur and professional teams, such training and testing drills usually rely on the subjective evaluation of the coach or trainer or on timing devices manually triggered by a human operator. Accordingly, they are subject to human perception and the error inherent in it. These variances and errors in human perception can lead to the best athlete not being determined and rewarded.
Moreover, efforts to meaningfully compile and evaluate the timing and other information gathered from these exercises and drills have been limited. For example, while the fastest athlete from a group of athletes through a given drill may be determinable, these known systems do not allow that athlete to be meaningfully compared to athletes from all over the world that may not have participated in the exact same drill on the exact same day.
Automated sensing and start/stop devices are used in some specific sports and competitions such as track and field and other track-based races, such as motorcycle, skiing, and horse races. These devices are usually expensive and complex, making them difficult to set-up, calibrate, and operate effectively. Accordingly, these devices are usually permanently installed at a particular facility. These facilities are often not regularly accessible to athletes for routine training purposes. Moreover, the data compiled by these devices is often not meaningfully compiled and accessible for athlete evaluation and comparison purposes.